A woman whose ‘perfect gentleman’ husband turned out to be a murderer says she only learned that he had killed his first wife, and was suspected of slaying his second, when the FBI called to warn her that she could be next.
Diane Beasley thought she had found her soulmate in husband John David Smith, from Medina, Ohio, and the two married after a whirlwind romance in 1998.
Little did she know, the FBI were already investigating her husband who they suspected had murdered his first two wives.
Smith had married his first wife, childhood sweetheart Janice Hartman, in 1970 at the age of 19. The pair divorced in 1974, and Hartman later disappeared.
Smith went on to marry again, to Betty ‘Fran’ Gladden – who vanished in 1991 a year into their troubled marriage.
But Smith had convinced Beasley he was simply unlucky in love, telling her his first marriage ended in divorce, and the second when his wife died of cancer. So Beasley was stunned when she received a blunt warning in 1999 from the FBI , who said he could be a killer.
In a new documentary, I Lived With a Killer, on the Crime + Investigation channel, Beasley revealed that the stark warning had left her reeling.
John David Smith (left) was sentenced to between 15 years and life imprisonment in 2001. His third wife Diane Beasley (right) thought he was her soulmate until receiving a call from the FBI tell her that her life was in danger
‘I was in total, total shock… I did not see anything but love for me through John’s eyes,’ Beasley said as part of a new show.
And when Smith went on the run, her doubts increased and the facade he had so careful painted began to crack, leading to her secretly filing for an annulment.
The FBI believed that Smith had murdered Hartman, days after their divorce in 1974, dismembered her body and hidden her remains inside a crude wooden box.
They also feared Fran’ Gladden, who was bed-bound before her disappearance after slipping on wet tiles. A note Smith claims she left merely said: ‘Be back in a couple of days. Feed the fish.’
Smith’s first wife, Janice Hartman (left), was murdered and her body dismembered and kept in a wooden box. His second wife, Betty Fran Gladden (right), vanished, and has never been found.
Smith claimed that he came home one day to find a note from Gladden stating that she would be gone for a ‘few days’ and reminding him to feed the fish (Pictured: TV show recreation)
For Beasley, the revelations came as a shock, the lies spun by Smith of being a ‘really sweet, really nice… perfect gentleman’ began to vanish.
Reinforcing her doubt, was the fact that Smith had previously told her that Hartman had filed for divorce and that Gladden, whose photograph hung on their living room wall, had died of cancer.
During his trial, Smith’s web of lies unfolded.
‘It was a terrible struggle knowing that I had been married for the last seven months to a man that could have done such terrible, horrific things,’ Beasley says on the show ‘I Lived With A Killer.’.
Despite the story Smith told Beasley about his and Hartman’s amicable divorce, court evidence would reveal a more shocking reality.
Hartman, who had married him at the age of 19, was subjected to physical and verbal abuse, according to the book The Stranger in My Bed.
Author Michael Fleeman wrote that Hartman’s family feared for her safety after noting ‘bruises on her face and on her arm.’
Shortly after filing for divorced in 1974 Hartman became a go-go dancer, which he claims enraged Smith all the more.
‘She was working out of his control – you know, showing herself off in front of other men,’ Fleeman said. ‘Just days after the divorce, another argument erupts. This one’s not just yelling, not just hitting. But in the end, Janice ends up dead.’
Two days after her death, Smith filed a missing persons report.
Evidence that would be revealed decades later, showed that he had in fact concealed the remains of Hartman’s body inside a wooden box in the garage of his grandfather’s home in Ohio.
Smith’s brother Michael found him making the box and upon asking him what he was doing, he was told that Hartman left some of her belongings.
Michael explained that he was ‘confused’ at the time and it ‘didn’t make sense’ that he would build a box instead of ‘something nice.’
It would take five years before the box would be opened, after the family noticed a stench and Michael was asked to investigate.
Opening the box in 1980, Michael noticed ‘some clothing. It’s kinda discolored,’
Agent Bob Hillard said to the show. He noticed a ‘funky smell’ and after moving some things around realized Hartman’s body was inside.
‘Janice had been dismembered and her legs had been cut off below the knee,’ Hillard added.
Michael confronted John, who took the box and dumped it on a road, where the remains were later found by police. Authorities were unable to identify the body at the time. Michael kept the secret until 1999.
The disappearance of Gladden, remains a little less clear. Smith met her while working at the same computer software company in Florida, the Mirror reported.
Smith met second wife Gladden (pictured left and right) while working at the same computer software company in Florida
Within a year he had allegedly proposed again and the pair had moved to New Jersey.
Less than a month before Gladden vanished, she broke her hip after slipping on a wet tile. The injury left her bed-bound.
‘Now Fran is an invalid. She can’t even leave the house. She’s in excruciating pain. She’s at John’s mercy,’ Fleeman told the show.
Smith later claims that he returned home to find that Fran had disappeared and had left a note to say she had left for a ‘couple of days,’ which Fleeman remains suspicious about.
Gladden’s family reported her missing and later discovered that Smith’s first wife also mysteriously vanished. The whereabouts of Gladden are still unknown to this day.
Her disappearance encouraged the FBI to reopen the case of Hartman, according to the show, but were only able to trace Smith after he was caught for a traffic violation in 1996.
They discover he was living in California and had remarried. The FBI went on ‘high alert’, and kept him under surveillance.
The team interviewed the Beasley family in 1999, and when Smith’s brother Michael who tells them that he found a box containing what he believes to be the remains of Hartman, he goes on the run.
Beasley’s daughter Summer, who was involved in a final confrontation with Smith shortly before he was arrested at their home. She described Smith as looking like a ‘devil person’
After filing for divorce Beasley returned to her family home. But Smith was ‘enraged’ by another woman trying to split up with him and raced to her house, the show alleges.
Beasley was at home with her daughter Summer and heard her husband kick down the door and him race up the stairs.
‘It wasn’t a mad person, it wasn’t an angry person. It was a devil person,’ Summer said on the show.
But the FBI were waiting too and quickly raced in to arrest Smith.
Beasley said: ‘I didn’t know someone could be that angry. I remember my heart was pounding out of my chest.
‘The adrenaline starts rushing and you wonder “Are you gonna be dead?’ You know, you wonder ‘How’s he gonna kill you?”‘
Smith was later sentenced to between 15 years and life imprisonment for the murder of Hartman.
Beasley claims to still visit Smith in prison in the hope of finding out more information about what happened to Hartman or to Gladden.
Smith still vehemently denies any involvement in either the death or the disappearance.
He is due for parole in December this year from Marion Correctional Institute.
Beasley’s determined to keep his story alive in the hope that no other woman can fall ‘victim to him,’ she explains
I Lived With A Killer, John Smith is on Monday, July 22, on Crime and Investigation.